Rise and Shine (35 page)

Then suddenly the local reporter interrupted the monologue she was doing to fill airtime, about the size of the projects and the crime rate there, which was even worse than I’d always suspected. She got a vacant look on her face, the look my sister had once told me meant you were listening to something in your earphone and therefore were never going to be good enough for network, and then she said, “Excuse me, Dan, but we’ve just been told that the suspect is going to be exiting the building in just a moment and that Meghan Fitzmaurice will be with him.” The camera took in the front door of the building, and sure enough, there was movement at the end of the long hallway, a blur of blue and white that materialized as though a Polaroid was developing behind the smeared glass, resolving itself into a clear picture as the doors swung open, the police still holding back.

Ah, how lucky she has always been in even the small things, our Meghan. That morning she had put on a plain white linen dress, so that she shone in the weak sunlight falling between the brick towers. She looked like a saint in a stained glass window, whittled away from body to simply soul, all eyes. Next to her was Armand’s friend Marvin, his head down. He was wearing a baseball cap, which made him look as though he was hiding his face. His hands hung limply at his sides, and I was certain he had been told that if they went into his pockets the guns would be raised and maybe even used. Meghan put one hand on his shoulder, and he appeared to flinch. She raised her chin slightly and looked out into the quadrangle as though she was there to talk to the residents grouped in small knots on the packed earth, not the phalanx of old electronic friends, the television cameras set up in a half circle.

“This man came here today to turn himself in to police. He is wanted in connection with the shooting here two weeks ago of my son, Leo Grater. Before he gave up, he wanted to speak to me and turn over the weapon used in that shooting. He is a person of faith who felt that God wanted him to do this before he spoke to the police. I knew that the New York City Police Department was looking for him, and it was important to me that no harm come to him before he could give himself up.”

“No harm come to him,” Evan said. “No harm. Let them shoot the scumbag right now.”

“Shhhhhh.”

“The police department was extremely cooperative in accommodating my desire to speak to him. I thank them.” She took her hand from Marvin’s shoulder, and he looked up, plainly terrified, as though Meghan’s touch was all that stood between him and a couple of good body shots from an automatic weapon. “I am not the only mother who has had a child shot in these projects,” she said. “They all deserve justice.” Then she nodded at the police officer nearest her as though by prearranged signal, and he and several others stepped forward and cuffed the kid. Even at a distance the news cameras picked up the sound of Meghan saying, “Don’t hurt him.” The police put Marvin in the back of one car, and Meghan got in the back of another, and suddenly Irving was standing in her place, in front of the door of the Tubman building where Tequila lived.

“At approximately twelve forty-five
P.M.
a suspect surrendered himself in the shooting of Leo Grater at the Tubman projects,” he said. “The suspect expressed the wish to surrender peacefully to Mr. Grater’s mother at the apartment of a mutual friend. Mr. Grater’s mother came from his hospital bed, where he is being treated for his injuries, to the Tubman projects and met with the suspect, who is identified as Marvin White, nineteen, a lifelong resident of the projects. Mr. White had with him the firearm he used in the shooting, which he turned over to Mr. Grater’s mother. He expressed to her his remorse about his actions and his hope that her son would recover fully from his injuries. He is now on his way to central booking. That’s all for now.”

“Commissioner,” one of the reporters cried, “does the suspect know who the victim’s mother is?”

Irving sighed. You could hear and see it: shoulders up, chin down. “I have no idea,” he said.

“Jesus Christ,” Evan said. I couldn’t speak. Another nurse came to the door of the room. “Someone from the police department called to say that Mrs. Grater will be back in about an hour,” she said.

“Mrs. Grater,” Evan said with contempt. “Mrs. Grater. Jesus.”

I was exhausted. “She’s right, you know,” I said wearily. “That could have been a bloodbath, with that guy holed up in Tequila’s apartment. Meghan probably kept the whole thing from blowing up.”

“Oh, was that the point of that exercise? The police could have gone in there and gotten him. That’s their job.”

“They could have shot up the apartment.”

“You believe that was what she was thinking? You’re amazing, Bridget. Do you stay up nights inventing excuses for her?”

“It is what it is, Ev,” I said with a shrug.

“Oh, can everyone stop saying that. Nothing is what it is. What is this—a hospital room or a fancy hotel? What is she, a martyr or a mother? What are you, a sister or an assistant? Do you live in this city? Nothing is what it is. No one looks their age. No one screws their spouse. No one likes their job. It is what it is? Where? What? When?” He stood up and walked out, then turned on his heel and shot back into the room, his fists clenched. “Let me tell you how a guy feels when someone shoots his son. He feels powerless. He wants to find the guy who did it and rip him apart with his bare hands. And instead he has to sit here and do nothing except wonder whether his son will be able to speak, and read, and feed himself, and walk again.”

He pointed up at the television. “And then she goes out and takes over. And she doesn’t even tell me. She doesn’t think, Well, maybe his father would want to be part of this. Maybe he could help me. Maybe he would at least want to know who the animal is who did this to his boy. Because it’s always been about her. You couldn’t figure out why I left, Bridge? I was never really there. I was an incidental character in the Meghan Fitzmaurice show. And, honest to God, you know as well as I do that you are, too.” Evan shook his head, his mouth working. “I want to see my son when she’s not here. Tell her that. We’ll have to divide up the time. I won’t be in the room with her.”

The set stayed on, telling me everything I already knew about my sister. Over and over again they replayed the clip of Meghan with her hand on Marvin’s shoulder. “Don’t hurt him,” she said. “Don’t hurt him. Don’t hurt him.” Then they returned to regularly scheduled programming, which was a soap opera, which seemed just right.

It was at least three hours before she came back into the room. The set was still on but with the sound muted. I was eating a tuna sandwich and reclining again, my swollen ankles elevated. Meghan’s dress was creased at the hips as though she had been sitting for a long time. She still shone as though she’d soaked up the light from the sun and the cameras and stored it deep inside.

“Anything?” she said, standing over Leo and looking down at his pale freckled face.

“Anything?” I said, the ubiquitous echo. “That’s all you’re going to say? Anything? Anything up with you? Want to give me a report on your day, on what the hell you were doing and what that was all about?”

She looked up at the set. A beautiful blonde was emoting soundlessly to a silver-haired man. I often wondered how Meghan felt when she looked at a TV set. Was it the way a cicada felt looking at its shed skin, its transparent shadow?

“Did they interrupt scheduled programming?” she said.

“Oh, come off it. Of course they did. Look, Meghan’s back. Oh, look, Bob, Meghan Fitzmaurice is back, and now she’s the star of her own personal drama. Well, actually, it’s her son’s drama, but let’s not quibble. She’s the hostage! Rise and shine!”

“Shut up, Bridget. You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

“I don’t think there was a whole lot of mystery to that performance, Meghan.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” she repeated. “Your friend Tequila called me. Her daughter called her and said this guy was in the apartment with a gun, crying, yelling, waving it around. It wasn’t a hostage situation. He spent an hour emoting, gave up the gun, talked about finding Jesus, blah blah blah. Tequila figured I could get him out of there and away from her daughter. And that’s what I did. I went over there and I pretended to listen to the guy and then I called Irving and I took care of business. I don’t know who called the TV people, but it wasn’t me. I just did what Tequila asked me to do.”

“Oh, come off it. ‘They all deserve justice.’ ‘Don’t hurt him.’ Compassionate Meghan, forgiving Meghan.”

“I don’t know why you’re so angry. You know how things work up there. You know what a mess that could have turned into. You know I’m right.”

And that, of course, was exactly why I was so angry. “You try to run everything!” I cried.

“Somebody has to,” my sister replied.

“Oh, now we’ve moved on to take-charge Meghan, who gets to have her career back and feel so good about herself at the same time. Not to mention that she gets to do it all for the benefit of the folks watching at home.”

“Don’t be stupid. You know what the cameras were good for? For insurance. It’s all too public now. No judge will give this guy a slap on the wrist. They will all know the whole world is watching. And they won’t be able to deal it down, lowball him or give him a pass. That son of a bitch will pay. He will pay for what he did to my boy. He will pay and pay and pay and pay.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Meghan sat down in the chair Evan had left. Her face was flat; the light was gone. “You’re right. You want to know what I was really doing? I was cleaning up your goddamn mess. Leo wouldn’t have even known these people if it wasn’t for you. He wouldn’t have even been in that shit-hole if it wasn’t for you. What you saw there? That was me cleaning up Bridget’s mess. Of course, because that’s what I do, don’t I? That’s what I’ve always done. My whole life.”

“You know, Meghan, there might have been a time when I would have swallowed that. But no more. Here’s what I believe: I believe you just bought your own rehabilitation on Leo’s back. I believe I’m going to spend the next ten years watching spots about urban violence and spinal cord injuries and the rights of the disabled so that you can be a star again. And if I figure out that’s true, I will never speak to you again as long as I live. Never.”

Out in the hospital atrium, I sat down heavily at one of the small tables. Without a word, the young aide brought me what I’d been having the last few days, a pot of chamomile tea and a pumpkin scone. The twins were perambulating wildly beneath my rib cage as though they, too, were undone and enraged. I took off my shoes, and when I tried to get up to leave, to go somewhere, anywhere, I found that I couldn’t get them back on my swollen feet, and I began to cry. Wordlessly the aide returned with a box of tissues and a stack of magazines. Perhaps she did not realize that one of them, one of the older ones, had my sister’s picture on the cover. “Meghan!” it said. “Fit and nearing 50!” The pianist was playing what seemed to be an endless medley of New York songs. Taking the A train, in a New York state of mind. After about a half hour, he wound up with a rendition of “New York, New York.” If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere.

“I hate this song,” Irving said, falling into the chair opposite me. “Sweetheart?” he called to the hospital aide. “Sweetheart, is there any way you could get a tired guy a beer? I don’t do the tea thing, and I’m really running on empty here.”

“I’m sorry, sir, but we don’t serve alcohol in the hospital.”

“Yeah, I guess I figured that. I just thought maybe an exception could be made.” He looked at me looking hard at him and added, “I think my pal here could use a drink, too.”

“I could use an explanation.”

“Not from me. I got dragged into this thing at the last minute. I still have to get a fill from the number one participant, who is around here somewhere. I’m just the guy who called the cops and kept things cool. But that was not my show.”

“Yeah, I know exactly whose show it was.
Show
is exactly the right word for it.”

Irving pulled a cigar from his breast pocket and rolled it between his thumb and finger. “I think you’re being hasty about this. I’m the last guy who wants your average civilian involved in something like that, and I’m going to rip Tequila the next time I see her about what she did. But you know as well as I do that your sister might have actually helped keep things under control there. Not great for the department, because one of the city columnists will be pounding the drum about how one little white woman could keep things cool when the cops usually can’t. But bottom line, she went in, she came out with the guy, we got the guy, she walked away, no one hurt. Finito.”

“Oh please. Finito? On what planet? She’ll be all over the news for the next two weeks.”

“If anyone can deal with that, she can.”

“That’s not what I mean. I mean she used this. She used this to get herself back on the map. And you helped her. You helped her.”

Irving looked at me, the cigar pivoting in his hand. The aide brought him a flowered teapot and a matching cup. He waved her away, but she put it down and winked. Irving looked inside the pot and smiled. I could smell the beer from where I sat. He poured from the teapot into the cup and sipped, then gulped.

“Thanks, sweetheart,” he called across the room.

“You’re not going to say anything to me?”

“I’m trying to modulate my temper before I do. So let me start at the beginning. You have a sister. She’s two people. She’s that person that everyone thinks they know. They make up stuff about her, in their own heads and in the papers, and some of it is right on the money and most of it is crap. Then she’s the person she really is, whatever that means. And she probably figures there’s nobody who knows who that is except your aunt, maybe, and you. It turns out that even her husband can’t tell the difference. And right now it seems like you can’t, either. You’re making the kind of judgment about what happened that reporters will make, and gossip columnists, and all those morons your sister invites over for dinner, the ones that eat her little bitty lamb chops and then trash her behind her back. And I gotta say, from where I’m sitting, the idea that you’re in that camp is pretty heinous.”